Morrisons staff to sue for data loss

Morrisons is being sued by thousands of its own staff after personal information was posted on the internet by an internal auditor.

The auditor in question is Andrew Skelton, who just so happens to have been sent to prison for eight years after he was convicted for a number of charges, including fraud by abuse of position.

He sent data to newspapers and uploaded information on 100,000 people to file-sharing sites. Why? He wanted revenge after he was told off at work. A fully grown adult there, getting revenge for being told off. Honestly.

According to JMW Solicitors, there's over 2,000 personnel participating in the joint case. Their data-specialist, Nick McAleenan, said: "My clients' position is that Morrisons failed to prevent a data leak which exposed tens of thousands of its employees to the very real risk of identity theft and potential loss."

"In particular, they are worried about the possibility of money being taken from their bank accounts and - in the case of younger clients - negative consequences for their credit rating. Whenever employers are given personal details of their staff, they have a duty to look after them."

Morrisons aren't commenting on the case as yet, but this is more trouble for a supermarket that isn't having the best of times at the moment. The chain dropped their nonsensical price match deal, but they did make a pizza that looked like a vagina, which is nice.

2 comments

Alex

What a pointless lawsuit- Morrison's cannot and will not be held liable for information disclosed by their auditor in an illegal way. The client auditor relationship is covered by umpteen confidentiality clauses, and the auditors by dint of what they do would have access to confidential information. If the auditor breaks that trust, they're 100% liable, not the company being audited.

Oh I take it back- the article didn't make it clear that he was an internal auditor, not an external one. Still, if Morrisons can prove that they had the necessary controls and systems in place to stop it happening accidentally, they should be fine.